This Legacy of Words

There is a folder on the desktop of my computer that is labeled Hermitage Notes. I created the folder in late December 2019 as a place to journal thoughts, reflections, and happenings. Something like this is not thematic. It follows no particular rhythm or reasoning. It simply collects and records. It simply progresses as I progress. It lives as an honest reflection of the one whose fingers manipulate the keys of the keyboard. I call it reflective journaling.

At some point in the future, provided the Lord continues to tarry and I still possess my faculties, the reflections collected herein will be uploaded and made available on Kindle and in print – joining my first two published collections … The Less Worn Path and Broken Pieces. Until then, I am pleased to share them here at Psalty Catholic and I thank you for taking the time to stop by.

To consciously live in a way that teaches us to use only what we honestly need, to treat all people as well as all life and material things with reverence, and to nurture an informed care for the environment according to the delicate balance created by God is far from the world’s way of thinking. It transcends and moves beyond a mindset of materialism and its accompanying soul-destroying effects. The transcendence carries us into realizing a life of spiritual pilgrimage where our dependence is utterly upon God rather than upon ourselves.

Depending utterly upon God is a foreign concept to most Westerners accustomed to employing their abilities to generate self-made comfort and ease.

A lot comes to light in an atmosphere of smallness and simplicity. Smallness and simplicity strip away superfluous exteriors that feed our ego. Abba Moses, one of the great Desert fathers, would counsel his monks: “Go, sit in your cell [tiny hermitage], and your cell [tiny hermitage] will teach you everything.” I get what Abba Moses is saying. I get what he is saying more now than when I first [back in 2007 or 2008] discovered these words of his.

In the cell-like atmosphere of smallness and simplicity of this little cabin in the woods, I have been able to begin to truly know myself apart from self-identifying possessions. I have been able to begin to truly know and experience the personhood of God, who seeks me and my companionship, without placing selfish material expectations upon him. These now nearly four years of living in this little shed-turned-cabin have been extremely fruitful spiritually.

Knowing that we will be leaving here in a few months has a definite sad side to it.

I have begun reading My Life in Christ by Saint John of Kronstadt [Born 1829 – Died 1909]. Here, during the turmoil being brought on by the liberal modernism that has infiltrated and rooted itself in the Western Church, I feel drawn to the old ones … to the ancient ones … to those who lived and wrote before the age of modernism. I feel drawn to those whose lives model a connection and continuity with the type of Christianity modeled by our brethren in the Eastern Church who know firsthand what it means to suffer for the faith.

I find Saint John of Kronstadt’s words very timely. Especially considering personal events of late.

You yourselves can see that man, in his word, does not die; he is immortal in it, and it will speak after his death. I shall die, but shall continue to speak even after my death. How much of this immortal word remains among the living, left behind by those who have died long ago! Sometimes this word still lives in the mouths of an entire people! How enduring is the word even of one ordinary man! Still more so is the Word of God. It will survive beyond all time, and will live and act forever.[1]

We all leave behind a legacy of words of one kind or another. Even the most ordinary among us. What legacy of words will I leave behind? What words of mine will live on long after I am gone? Now, at this age and stage of life, these are haunting questions. One of the haunting realities of words is that words can be terribly costly … some will even turn us away because of our words; especially when our words are weighty with truth.

This legacy of words? It certainly is not for fame and fortune that I write these words. It is certainly not for fame and fortune that I invest the time and effort in recording and publishing Psalty Catholic videos on YouTube and podcasts on the anchor.fm platform.

Why then? For the twos and threes. For the one that happens along. One day, hopefully, my children and grandchildren will want to hear my voice after I am gone and all that remains are some memories and a few old photographs.

What have I to say to them that is of any real value? Only these words that are written and spoken from the heart. Only this legacy of words.

I think a lot these days about Philippians 3:7-11. The implications and applications apply beyond the prestige and status that the Apostle Paul knew in Judaism before his conversion to Christianity on the road to Damascus. [Acts 9] They apply even more so to every type of idol and the idolatries that we give ourselves to. The implications and applications apply to anything or anyone that we allow to usurp the place of Christ in our lives and our worship of the One True God.

The Apostle wrote in these verses …

“But the things that were gain to me, the same I have counted loss for Christ. Furthermore I count all things to be but loss for the excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ my Lord; for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but as dung, that I may gain Christ: And may be found in him, not having my justice, which is of the law, but that which is of the faith of Christ Jesus, which is of God, justice in faith: That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable to his death, If by any means I may attain to the resurrection which is from the dead.”

What does it mean to know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings? What does it mean to be made conformable to his death? Attaining to the resurrection of the dead depends upon discovering what these things mean.

The answers to these questions will never be found in any health and wealth philosophy or doctrine that feeds the human ego with generous helpings of greed and pride. I know. I spent a few years in that so-called movement. The modern Christianized Materialism Movement that bloomed in the latter part of the Twentieth Century is dangerously deceptive. The answers to these questions are, however, easily found in the lives of the Saints, especially the lives of the Saints that endured great trials and persecutions on behalf of Christ and his Church.

I cannot happily content myself with any philosophy that exalts in me that which stands in direct opposition to God.

[1] Saint John of Kronstadt, My Life in Christ